Metrolink608 The Railroad Facts Of Life (1)
Shelley J Alongi

 

Even after finding the flaw I still like him. I guess it just proves we’re all human, even Glen the engineer. The last two weeks have been about the railroad facts of life, the changing of the routes, the death of the yellow bag, breakfast at the station, goodbye, the call, and oh so sweet reconciliation. There’s the train show, the switch key, rain, funny railfan stories, sweet Carey saving my life, and love. It’s all part of the adventure. and it’s all good. It’s all so so good!

An Unfortunate Event
Last Monday and Tuesday February 8 and 9 I did not make it to see Glen’s train. I worked till 6:45 and kept all my hours. I need them. Money is being its usual trouble again, partly my fault, well, maybe all my fault, let’s just be honest here since the whole idea is to be honest in this online journal. If I’m doubly honest, for whatever reason, I don’t like not getting to that station to see Glen. I’m a grown up girl; I can handle it. I guess it’s just a sign that I’m starting to get attached there, too. If going to the station means I’ll see Glen, all the better. I’ve discovered, and maybe I’ve written it once or twice, that the station is a place for me to get away from the computer, spend time outdoors, and be social. Sometimes the people there, the conversation, and the things that happen are not to my liking, but that’s really okay. I have a job, a hobby that keeps me connected with people, and an engineer. Wait, I have several engineers and I’m about to get more. But Monday and Tuesday I don’t see any trains, any engineers, only work, and then run some errands.

This is the week that things happen. Monday night Janice says she’ll go see Glen for me. I exit the Disney building take the ID with its metal ring and Tinker bell clip and hang it on my bag. It hangs down from the clip on the bright yellow railroad bag. The bright yellow railroad bag this week sees its last usages since it is badly torn. No longer at this writing will it be a signal for Glen or any other engineer that I wait to approach the laire. The yellow bag no longer hangs over my shoulder. At this writing I’ve gone back to my red monogrammed bag, just as big, a little more accepting of my two brand new aluminum canes, and even accommodating to my blue jacket. It, too, I’m afraid will be replaced, soon. Both the jacket and the bag carry engineer memories, but they are preserved now, written down as a testament to their existence in this veil of tears, engineer tears it turns out. Ah, but I digress. Monday, exiting the building I call to tell Janice that she can go see Glen for me. Stepping into the crosswalk, heading for Vons to get cupcakes and other necessary items like shampoo and toothpaste, (cupcakes are always necessary), my phone rings again. It is Janice. She didn’t make it to see Glen, she says. What? I fling back, now see what you did? You broke my engineer’s heart. He’s devastated. That’s if he was even there. But I know nothing of that now, I only know that she didn’t make it to see him. It’s really okay. Not less than five minutes later she calls again. I’m sitting down next to a plate of fish tacos and beans ad rice.

“If you heard it on the news,” she says, “I want you to know I told you first.”

It seems a man for some undetermined reason sat on the edge of the dock, just past the wheelchair ramp utilized by Metrolink trains when they push their morning and afternoon passengers toward Los Angeles. . Sitting there with his legs dangling, he waits as others do on train 4. Amtrak’s southwest Chief, train 4 in the evening and train 3 in the morning, approaches, its engineer laying on the horn, warning the man that he is coming, like a good engineer. Apparently, at the last minute, he gets up, but not before getting severely gashed by the grab iron on the ladder on the locomotive, bequeathing to the unfortunate man a severe gash along the forehead. The man rushed to the hospital, turns out, I find out later, to be an x Amtrak employee. No one to this date or at least to my knowledge knows why he sat there, or his name. People standing by the ramp waiting to board the train do not move to stop him from sitting there. All kinds of speculation races through the station faithful; he is a foamer, no, he’d no better than to do that; he’s drunk; possibly, well, we would have made him move off the dock, says Dave the Trucker.

The engineer, according to station sources, sits there for a while, not in the cab, and decides he wants to be relieved of his duties. He has to be drug tested after any accident. Why did the engineer wait three hours? When I get through there at 9:00 to wait for my bus number 4 is still sitting there, waiting, it seems, for a replacement engineer from Kingman, Arizona. I don’t go over there on Monday, I learn all this later. This time no one dies, the engineer is lucky, I suppose. Why would he want to be relieved of his duties? Only he would know that. The conductor, too, decides he wants off his route. No, says the road foreman, you can do this, but is relieved at Needles. Train crews! Some days you can’t live with them! Yeah, ask me, I know that.

Tuesday I get to the station just in time to go see if anyone sits on the east end of the platform. The weather is quiet. The station is quiet, too. A motorcycle cop or some such authority, Dave the trucker tells me, whizzed by the café on Monday, asking Janice and him what happened. Janice waved at the train, she tells me the night before, the engineer stops the train right in front of the café. The engineer, it turns out, apparently, plugs the train. Remember a couple of months ago I wrote that this is a last resort effort by the engineer to stop the train before hitting something or someone. This time the person is already hit, but the train must stop. Its usual stopping place is at the east end of the platform, in the ballast. Out there, there is no safety line on the tracks. It’s just the gravel, the rails and you. Letting the air out of the train, or plugging it, can cause some damage to passengers and equipment, but is in this instance necessary. Bruce, the station haunt, comes up to the conductor, asking questions.

“not now, Bruce,” they tell him, and for good reason. They don’t have Time for Bruce’s endless barrage of questions. I only stay long enough to get the sketchy details and then return to dock 4 to catch my bus home. I know nothing of what is about to occur.
Heartbroken by the Railroad
Wednesday is a good day. It ends on a calm note, I don’t remember much about it so it must be fine, and so I exit the building again, removing my I.D. and placing it on the yellow bag. The bus obligingly lets me off at the station, I make my way in, ordering ham and cheese for the meal. Janice works her job at the theater, Bob sits there quietly, watching the Metrolink pull in and out, enjoying another uneventful day at the station. At 6:45 I make my way over to track 3, waiting. The MPI locomotive approaches. It comes to rest at its marker, I approach. But tonight there is something different. The engineer, late, rings his bell constantly. I know that Glen is not here. The man, apparently feeling my pain or something, looks out his window.

“Glen isn’t here,” he says. “He’s running different trains. He might go to Riverside.”

This shouldn’t completely surprise me though I have no indication of Glen’s departure from this route. Last week, sitting in the café listening to Bruce and Peter have their animated conversation about trains, I overhear that Richard on 608 will bid for 608 and 609. These two trains are afternoon trains, 609 going from Ocean Side to Los Angeles and 608 returning to Ocean side. Briefly I wonder if Glen will change routes. I do not get a chance to ask him. Since I did not make it to his train on Monday I did not get to ask him, and so now I find out that he is not on his usual run. The engineer says something and then they are gone.

“That wasn’t our usual driver was it?” says one of the passengers as we cross the bridge back to the north side of the tracks.

I’m amazed and disappointed though I can’t say I didn’t in the back of my head at least know it was coming. Part of me wonders why Glen didn’t tell me but really does he have to? He’s not accountable to me is he? Besides I have his phone number; I can ask him. At the north side of the track I’m already digging for my phone. I don’t know if I’m more upset at myself for being upset or if I’m disturbed because he hasn’t toll me. Women! They complicate everything! Or at least I do, sometimes! It’s one of my personality quirks, one that I don’t always like. Maybe my expectations of Glen are just too high! Or maybe I’m too attached! Whatever!

“Don’t think,” I admonish myself as I pull out my phone and find his name on the contact list.

“Glen,” I say, not something I say unless I’m surprised. I can tell I am. “Did you bid off your route?”

“We changed jobs,” he says. “They changed service.”

The part about changing service is true; changes to Metrolink schedules have been in the works for months. Back in September when I waited for Metrolink 111 to Chatsworth in Los Angeles I remember the station agent saying they were hanging new time tables. Metrolink when I called back then said no there weren’t new times, those changes were down the line, so I don’t know what the agent was hanging; maybe it was new copies of the old time tables. Whatever they were, the changes have been coming so Glen’s mentioning of them isn’t completely a surprise. But changing jobs? Well okay they might be changing jobs but he can have any job he wants, according to him. I’m assuming in my head that he bid off the route.

“My last day is Friday,” he says. He’s either going to Riverside or Lancaster.

When Glen says he might go to Riverside, he has two choices. The riverside line serves seven stations, the 91 line serves the Riverside line and parts of Orange County, Fullerton being among the stations served. Where will he be? Does he even know?
“Lancaster?” says Andy the Metrolink agent two days later when I see him. “In Lancaster he’s going to want those cameras! Shot guns! Body guards!” Lancaster apparently isn’t a good route.

“More money,” says the engineer on Thursday’s train.

“Okay,” I say, “I will see you Friday then. Not tomorrow.”

We disconnect the call. I didn’t ask so many questions. I didn’t know what to ask. I’m not very coherent, it seems, all because an engineer bidded off a route, put his name up for another one, one that would be a lot closer to home for him. Hey he’s the number one engineer, he can have what he wants, maybe. Most likely yes.

“I talked to Richard on Friday,” Andy tells me Monday February 15. “Glen has top priority. It makes a lot more sense for him to start closer to home.”

Yes, Andy, I know all that; we’ve had that conversation, and glen tells us earlier that he is the number one engineer, he has the best job. Well apparently he wanted better than the best. With an hour commute in the morning to work I think I’d be bidding off my route, too. He used to run the train to Burbank Airport, Brian another Metrolink agent tells me earlier. Those runs were from Los Angeles Union Station to Burbank Airport. “He hated those routes,” Brian explains when he tells me that Glen’s son drives a race car. This happens months ago, of course, before I officially learn of it. But tonight I’m just mad because he didn’t tell me even though he doesn’t have to, and distraught that I’m losing my engineer on a train whose schedule I can mostly make. I put my phone away in its bag and make my way to the east end of the platform. By the time I get there I’m in tears, a state which lasts at least three hours, though I’m observant of what goes on.

“I’m losing my engineer,” I explain to the people who sit down there.

“Did he get bumped?” Dave Norris asks.

“I’m not sure,” because at that time I wasn’t sure.

Around me the trains pull in and out; I’m thinking about how Chatsworth got me to the train station, how I wanted to meet the engineer, how I finally learned the name of one of them, the name which I unwittingly picked for my engineer character in a completely fictionalized story, about how Janice helped me find him, about our conversations, my attachment, my intense experience, and I’m just devastated. All over two minutes! I can’t remember the last time I was so upset. Never mind that I have his phone number and never mind that he tells me we’ll talk again, and never mind that I know this happens an that he might even be through here at a different time, tonight none of that matters. None of it! All I know is I’m losing Glen and I’m a heartbroken adolescent teenage railfan with a crush on an engineer who’s abandoning me. Could it get more dramatic than that? A married one at that! Honestly! It doesn’t matter! Larry, Dave, Robert, no, not Robert, I don’t remember now, talk politics. They tell some funny stories about the kinds of practical jokes they pulled at Cal State fullerton, things I can relate to because I’ve been on the escalator that they’ve turned off just to see people’s reactions. I chuckle a few times knowing what they’re talking about.

“I can’t believe how distraught I am,” I tell Dave Norris sitting on the bench beside the wall I’ve chosen as my perch.

“About what?”

“About losing the engineer,” I say.

“Oh, you can have business that will take you to Los Angeles occasionally,” he says. “It will work out,” he tells me later.

“I know,” I breathe hopefully, and I know it will. I do have his phone number. But tonight I’m just sad.

Feeling Sorry for Me

“Glen isn’t here,” says the engineer on Thursday’s train. Andy laughs when I say that.

“Shelley has something to tell you,” Janice says to Andy when he comes in on Friday to the café.

“What?”

“Glen is being transferred to Riverside or Lancaster,” I tell him.

“What?” I don’t remember what he says.

“Shelley’s already looking for a job in Riverside,” Dan says. “A branch office of Disney.”

“I am not!” Now I’m laughing. These guys are ruthless.

On Thursday, I tell Andy, the engineer tells me Glen’s not here. Maybe they feel sorry for me. I don’t’ know. I’ve put my name on the early release list today so I can go hang out at the station, I’m not as upset as I was, but if I can go early, I will. There is a system to this, I’ve discovered. After so many hours, when I’ve done my allotment or enough for the day, I put my name on the list. One minute after putting my name on that list I’m released. I figure if Glen is on the 608 and if he is leaving and I can’t make his new schedule I’m going to early release. After all, even if I do get in trouble with him, he doesn’t have to know does he? And here I go trying to analyze my decision with the old rules. It’s good advice he gives but now I’m out of there like a bat out of Chatsworth I say on a bad day. I don’t think today has been especially bad, though, I just want out of there. Standing at train 608 he’s not there. I don’t get to ask the engineer’s name, he’s gone but not before telling me that he thinks Glen might go to Lancaster.

Thursday isn’t so bad, though. However I know before I get home after hearing more funny stories, this Time about cats attacking possums and what cats do outside, that I am not going to work on Friday. Everyone else gets a three day weekend. This Time I’m giving myself one. It’s not because I really can’t face the fact that Glen might be leaving, it’s because I have to make one of my infamous trips to the bank and I want to go to an NFB meeting on Saturday and I really don’t’ want to cram two events especially one of financial significance into one day. If I don’t’ make it out of there on time I won’t get to the bank and on and on it goes, so heck, I’m taking the day off, I’m coming to Fullerton for breakfast, I’m going to go say goodbye to my engineer, and then I’m going to run my errands and come back and say goodbye again. It’s a good thing I don’t’ call out of work very often because if I did I wouldn’t have points to spend on emergencies. This isn’t as bad as the emergency that gives me an additional day off next Friday, but It’s enough for me. I’m going to see Glen twice. If I never see him again, I will have seen him twice on Friday.


The morning is pleasant enough. I really like mornings at the Fullerton station When I have a late shift, say 9:00 or even 10:00 to 7:00 pm I like to come here and just sit. I’ve told you about this many times, I know you know what the atmosphere is like here. I show up and take my breakfast outside. Today it’s the Santa Fe scramble with extra bacon. Ana forgets the bacon I have To go into the café and remind her.

“Oh,” she says, and makes it. I enjoy it and then go down to the end of the platform. Past the wheelchair ramp there is a high section of wall, followed by a low one, a light, not a railroad signal, but a pole giving light to the station. This is almost the place where the ex Amtrak employee got hit, where the guy put down his cell phone and wallet and curled up under the tracks and was done in by a freight train. Given the solitude of this place I’m surprised no one has said it’s off limits to people. But then where would people wait or board the Metrolink trains? The Amtrak trains stop just east of the ramp. I take my position on the last section of wall, waiting. I always carry my yellow bag with me, my black fanny pack. I text message Melanie, my early morning texting partner. She leaves for school at 7:45. She’s up at 5:00 in the morning, and texts me periodically during that two and a half hour time frame. I remember when I first got a message from her. I had just sent a text message to Glen saying good morning or something and five minutes later received a text message. I jumped a little; it couldn’t be Glen he never responds and it’s too early he’s probably on shift right now. It wasn’t Glen, of course. It was Melanie. Now it has become a regular event texting Melanie every day except the days when I don’t catch the bus at 5:30 in the morning. Now here I sit texting Melanie. The train going to Los Angeles from Irvine comes into the station, pulling its cars, not pushing as do the others. It pulls further down the platform, the engine just reaching its edge. I don’t wave. I don’t know why. I just sit quietly. I know that soon I’m going to have to come up here and try to make contact with the other engineers, but today I’m waiting for one. I guess this one has been my practice run. Now I know how to do it; I know where to find them; now it will be up to each individual engineer whether or not thy will respond. They’ll all ask me if I need the train. Conductors will probably want to know if I need the train. Passengers will try to ask me if I need the train. I’ll have to retrain everyone, so to speak. No I don’t need the train. If I need the train I’ll b standing down where the cars are, not where the engine sits. I always wonder about people’s logic. I guess they’re trained to ask if someone needs help. Carrie asks a lady once where she’s going, so I’m sure it’s just part of the job. Usually after learning I don’t need the train they usually just back off and let me be. Glen asked me if I needed the train. Then he let me approach it. But now none of that happens. People get on the train, it pulls away and is gone to its day. Here I sit. The next train is 607, Glen’s train, and I am glad that this morning at least it will have the sweet bell. All the cab cars so far have the pneumatic bells. I don’t know what will happen in the new cab cars that will be showing up, soon. Will their bells be pneumatic or prerecorded? I don’t know. Today none of it matters.

Time elapses. It is quiet. Not much happens here in the morning. I don’t see the man who was buying or selling stereo equipment that spoke to me earlier when I met this train a few months back. I only wait. This is a dramatic moment for me because it signals the end of something and the beginning of a new adventure. Well maybe not completely since he’ll be back here tonight. But if someone misses a signal or something…I don’t dare think like that. Railroading days don’t end till passenger and crew are tucked safely in bed or their houses or destinations. Glen knows this.

“Is it a good day up here?” I’ve asked once.

“So far,” he has responded, and he is right.

So maybe my adventure isn’t completely ending for the day, but if he doesn’t come back tonight for some reason, this might be my last chance.

“What’s up?”

Glen speaks after doing something to the air in the cab car, something that everyone does. I don’t know what it is he’s doing it’s one of my questions.

“Good morning,” I say, getting up.

“Are you working today?”

Oh brother here we go again. I approach the cab car. It is not loud; the engine is behind us; I can hear him just fine.

“I had stuff to do,” I explain. I don’t say I’ve taken off to see him because I’m so attached to my first engineer. He’s so perfect though; I don’t know if he knows his significance to me. Maybe he does. I think it’s an artistic, creative kind of thing placing significance on people who are attached to events. How was I to know that he knew someone who got killed on the Chatsworth train? This is the event that helped steer the course of my life, helped me find the hobby that takes everything I have: hands, head, and heart. It’s intellectually, emotionally and just plain stimulating, and I haven’t even told you about next week yet. Here I am standing on this end of the platform talking to the first locomotive engineer not to talk to me but to interact with me on a regular basis. Maybe it’s because I sent him a note or just because he’s friendly or something. I could analyze it to high heaven but now I just stand here and say “I have stuff to do.”

“Yeah?” he says, a question in his voice, quiet, and somehow I’m ambivalent about it all.

“I decided I better do it,” I say.

“So who kicked you off your route?” I now ask.

“We’re changing jobs.”

Why does he tell me that?

“It’s something different, I guess,” he says. I’m not sure why he says it like that.

I don’ even remember my response. I’m not sure there is one, because suddenly it’s Time to go and he’s telling me to have a good day.”

“Okay,” I say, “see you tonight.”

He pulls 607 away from the platform, I head back to the station and make my turn to catch the bus. I’m glad I did this but I’m not sure he heard me say I had stuff to do and I don’t know what will happen next.

Somehow it takes all day to get everything done, the bank, the check, lunch, whatever I do and now it’s 4:00 and I’m heading back to the station.

“We’ll see how you are when it’s time to say goodbye,” Janice says yesterday. I haven’t told her I’m taking today off. I end up back there, ordering food, talking to people, and then talking to Andy. Someone in Riverside missed a train and missed the last train, 708 to Fullerton. She missed her train, he says, because she was timid and didn’t get on. The conductor, he says, closed the door even though he was trying to assist the lady in getting on the train. Take the 608 at Orange, he says and meet me here in Fullerton. Now Andy’s plan is to get the lady on number 4 so she can get to Riverside tonight. As a backup plan, Andy buys a ticket on number 4 just in case the conductor won’t honor her Metrolink ticket.

Now I stand waiting for 608. I remember the first Time I stood waiting for this train, with the engineer whose name I knew. Monday night I won’t know his name.

The bell approaches, far back as usual. The train comes to rest beside me.

“So did you get it all done?”

Glen remembered! He remembered I had errands! I approach the cab, grab onto the rail, jump up and down like a child or a marionette.

 

 

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Copyright © 2010 Shelley J Alongi
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